


even though i couldn't say goodbye (you'll always be with me)

by heartrecord



Category: TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Given AU, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:00:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24502756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartrecord/pseuds/heartrecord
Summary: the morning after yeonjun’s passing, soobin wakes up and doesn’t know anything.[ a small study on grief, and how things eventually get better. ]
Relationships: Choi Beomgyu/Choi Soobin, Choi Soobin/Choi Yeonjun
Comments: 13
Kudos: 63





	even though i couldn't say goodbye (you'll always be with me)

**Author's Note:**

> this fic's plot is based on given, and while it's not necessary for you to watch it, i definitely recommend that you do! 
> 
> much love to angel for all the support you've given me and this fic, i wouldn't have been able to complete this without you.

the morning after yeonjun’s passing, soobin wakes up and doesn’t know anything.

to clarify; soobin doesn’t know how to feel about _it_ yet. about yeonjun no longer being capable of waking up in the same manner that he does, now stuck in an eternal sleep. soobin blinks slowly, and the mere action feels so wrong, like he shouldn’t be doing it.

not when his boyfriend can’t experience the same thing ever again.

maybe if he goes back to sleep right now, he won’t have to accept it just yet. the fact that yeonjun is dead.

the moment the sentence plants itself into his brain, it keeps on repeating itself like a broken record.

yeonjun is dead. yeonjun is dead. yeonjun is _dead_ –

soobin squeezes his eyes shut, buries himself deep into the blanket.

maybe if he never finds out how to feel about it, then he won’t have to at all.

* * *

_“you know i'd do anything for you!”_

_yeonjun is yelling, has been yelling for a while now and god, soobin just wants this argument to **end** already._

_he clenches his fists, opens his mouth –_

_“so would you die for me then!?_ _”_

* * *

soobin wakes up for the second time that day, heart beating erratically in his chest. he isn't crying, which is strange.

he should be, considering the dream he just had. he inhales and exhales as he tries to calm his heartbeat, raising a hand to absently wipe at his eyes even though there are no tears.

a glance at the clock tells him that it's already 1 in the afternoon. maybe he should get up.

he doesn't.

* * *

they hold the funeral two days later.

it goes by in a blur, and all soobin really remembers is staring blankly at yeonjun's portrait at the center of the altar, at twinkling eyes, pouty lips curved into a smile.

a smile he'll never get to see in person ever again.

he doesn't cry at the funeral either. he knows that he should, but the tears just won't come.

why won't they come?

* * *

_a beach on a winter's day. a boy with faded blue hair, guitar case strapped to his back._

_yeonjun._

_“whoa, it’s freezing! how stupid is this!? let’s go home!”_

_then_

_“wait, you've never been to the ocean? are you serious? ah crap, i’m sorry i said this was stupid. the ocean’s amazing, the best!”_

_a walk along the beach, footprints of slightly different sizes imprinted into the sand._

_“i'm drilling it into your head that i'm the first person you've ever come to the ocean with, soobinnie.”_

_a smug smile, which then softens into a gentle one – so gentle that it makes soobin’s heart stutter in his chest._

_“i want to remember coming here, even though it's freezing and this was, quite frankly, a bad idea. i want to remember humming weird songs.”_

_soobin feels the need to take yeonjun’s hand so he quickens his pace, reaches out –_

_but then yeonjun is so far away from him, that even as soobin tries to catch up to him he just can’t, and this – this wasn’t what happened that day._

_soobin doesn’t remember running, running, running – running so hard he barely has time to catch his breath._

_he doesn’t remember yeonjun walking so far ahead until he’s just a speck in the distance, until it’s impossible for soobin to reach him._

_“hyung, wait –”_

_the scene shifts, and suddenly soobin is in a room. yeonjun’s bedroom._

_he is in yeonjun’s bedroom, his boyfriend’s guitar in his arms._

_and yeonjun is, he is –_

_soobin’s eyes are wide as he has to relive this nightmare again, fingers gripping the strings so tight._

_it hurts so much and he can’t breathe, he can’t **breathe** –_

* * *

when soobin wakes up, he is gasping for breath, tears streaming down his cheeks.

‘bring him back, bring him back, bring him back’ is what he chants endlessly in his head and it makes him so sad, this part of him that is still hoping for a miracle. this part of him that is still hoping for yeonjun to be next to him when he wakes, to gather him in his arms and reassure him that he’s here, that he’s not going anywhere.

wouldn’t it be nice, if this was all just a very long nightmare?

but it isn’t.

soobin can wish and beg and cry all he wants.

choi yeonjun is gone.

he is gone and he is never coming back.

(he realises belatedly that these are the first tears he’s cried ever since the incident. it gives him a strange kind of comfort, to know that he is still human after all.)

* * *

soobin had never been good at words.

ever since yeonjun died, he’s been thinking he shouldn’t have been blessed with the ability to speak at all.

because why was it that he was suddenly capable of using his voice when it came to hurting others?

soobin hadn’t meant it, when he asked yeonjun if he would die for him.

of course he hadn’t.

surely yeonjun would have been able to tell, he was always able to differentiate when soobin was joking or being serious after all.

he had always been able to _hear_ soobin, figure out the hidden meaning beneath his words.

but then he didn’t, for the first time.

the first time that turned out to be the only time.

_“so would you die for me then!?”_

he’d regretted those words the moment they escaped his lips; regretted them so much when he saw the look on yeonjun’s face.

those seven words haunt him day and night, dig their claws into him and refuse to let go.

it’s a punishment, soobin thinks. a punishment he can’t even be mad about because it’s what he deserves.

it’s what he deserves for stealing yeonjun away from the people who loved him, who still needed him in their lives.

and if he has to bear with this for the rest of his life until yeonjun can forgive him, until soobin can forgive _himself_ …

then so be it.

* * *

a week after yeonjun’s funeral, his mother gives soobin his guitar.

“i’m pretty sure he would’ve wanted you to have it,” she says softly. “and if anything, i know you’ll make better use of it.”

 _but i can’t_ , he wants to protest. _i don’t even know how to play the guitar_.

the words are right there on the tip of his tongue, but he can’t bring himself to say them. not when yeonjun’s mother had this look in her eyes, like she might start crying at any moment.

so soobin takes it, the guitar that had caused a rift to appear between him and yeonjun in the first place. he should despise it, has every right to.

but instead he just feels numb.

when he runs his fingers absently across the strings, he notices one of them is broken.

soobin wants to fix it. but he doesn’t know how to.

he doesn’t know if he _can_.

* * *

soobin visits yeonjun’s grave the day after.

yeonjun’s guitar is in its case, strapped to soobin’s back. he doesn’t know why exactly, but he felt the need to bring it along. he doesn’t have anything else with him. not even flowers. maybe that would’ve been more appropriate.

he can’t find the right things to say, unable to muster even an apology to the boy who had shone so bright like the sun. the boy who had been his light, the light _soobin_ had snuffed out without meaning to.

 _i’m sorry_ , he should be saying. _i’m sorry for saying what i did, i’m sorry i’m sorry i’m sorry_.

instead there is only a lump in his throat where his words are supposed to be.

pathetic. he is so pathetic.

* * *

sometimes, soobin indulges in his thoughts about being able to turn back time even though he knows very well that he can’t.

if he was able to go back to the time of their argument, to that one moment that would become the turning point in their lives – would soobin have said something different? something less horrible, less murderous than _“so would you die for me then!?”_ ?

or would he have just stayed silent, let yeonjun yell until he couldn’t anymore before going back to how they were, happy in their own little world.

if he had done that, would yeonjun still be alive?

would yeonjun be by his side, holding his hand and smiling at him like he’s the most beautiful person he’d ever set his eyes on?

* * *

here’s a secret that soobin keeps close to his chest.

the truth is, whenever yeonjun mentioned writing a song for him, soobin had always been waiting for him to say _“_ _hey, wanna do it together?”_.

he knows how much yeonjun loved music, never meant to hate the one thing his boyfriend was passionate about.

but he couldn’t help it, with the way it kept taking the older away from him. soobin felt like he saw less of him with each passing day as ever since yeonjun started playing in a band, he was spending all his free time either practising or working part time.

and as much as soobin didn’t want to let himself be consumed by ugly feelings, because this is yeonjun and he is supposed to trust that the older will always come back to him at the end of the day; jealousy won out anyway, reared its head in his direction.

soobin, jealous of _music_. how much more pathetic can he get?

now he’ll never be able to hear the song yeonjun was so excited about.

he wonders what it would have sounded like.

* * *

mourning takes a lot out of him.

everytime he types out a text to yeonjun before it sinks in that he can’t reply, everytime he buys yeonjun’s favourite ramen just to remember that he’ll be the one eating it, everytime he cooks enough food for three even though it’s only him and his mother and there will be no boyfriend coming over for dinner anymore – it only serves to make another piece of him fall away.

his _hello_ 's and _i miss you_ 's and _i love you_ 's can no longer be returned by the person he wants, by the voice he's come to love the most.

he knows this. he _knows_ , alright?

but that doesn’t mean it hurts any less.

because half of soobin’s world had always consisted of yeonjun; of paper planes and loud laughter and boyish grins. of hands held in the dark and playful kisses and lazy cuddles in soobin's bed.

yeonjun had been soobin's anchor, had grounded him for as long as he could remember and now that he is no longer here to fill in the spaces between his fingers with his own, to wrap his arms around him and hug him close –

how is soobin going to make sure he doesn’t end up floating away, to a place nobody can reach?

as it turns out, he doesn’t know the answer to this question.

he doesn’t know if he ever will.

* * *

there is a shadow of a person dwelling deep inside him. of a boy he can no longer hold on to.

soobin wonders if it’ll ever go away.

wonders if there will ever be a time where he’ll be able to recover all the pieces he’s lost and put himself back together again.

* * *

a long time later, when the cherry blossoms are in full bloom and soobin has officially entered his second year of high school – he meets a boy. a boy who seemed a little lonely, a little lost.

a boy who was quiet at first upon their first meeting but had been immediate to speak up when he noticed the broken string on yeonjun's guitar that he was holding in between his arms.

_“you're saying this can be fixed?”_

_“huh? of course it can. why are you carrying around a guitar if you don't even know that?”_

despite the roughness of his tone, he had fixed the string with gentle hands. had set soobin's world that had stuttered to a stop into motion again with a single note.

a long time later, soobin falls in love with choi beomgyu – with his bright eyes and the way he laughs like everything matters. 

with the spring he brought with him, warm breeze soothing over the chill of the winter that soobin felt he had been stuck in for the longest time.

_“do you really think i can be my own light?”_

_“i don't just think. i believe you can be a light so dazzling that everyone else can't bring themselves to look away.”_

a long time later, soobin brings the boy he loves to the ocean – the glow of the sunset reflects itself onto the water, making it sparkle orange and yellow.

there's a foot of space between them, which soobin closes, nudging his side against beomgyu's gently. beomgyu shifts his gaze towards him and grins. soobin smiles back.

_“it's beautiful, isn't it?”_

_“yeah. it is.”_

(beomgyu is only partly talking about the ocean, but soobin doesn't need to know that. at least, not yet.)

something in his chest swells, and he can’t help the laughter that bubbles up his throat and out of his lips as he slowly reaches down to link their pinkies together.

sunny days, rainy days, cloudy days. spring, summer, autumn, winter.

there was once a time where yeonjun had been in all of them, in everything that soobin saw. now, that isn't really the case.

yeonjun was and still is important to him, he always will be. but soobin has someone new he's in love with. someone he wants to fully cherish with all his heart.

a year and a half after yeonjun's passing, soobin thinks he can finally feel his missing pieces sliding back into place. 

_“are you happy, choi soobin?”_

yeah. he is.

soobin is happy.

**Author's Note:**

> *wipes a single tear* that was kinda all over the place, huh? 
> 
> this is the first proper piece i've written in 3 years and i've gotten a bit rusty, so feedback is always appreciated. 
> 
> thank you for reading, and i hope you have a lovely day <3


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